About

Dark Souls™ - The Board Game

£3,771,474

pledged of £50,000 goal

31,178

backers

Dark Souls™ - The Board Game is a strategically challenging, deeply immersive combat exploration game for 1-4 players set in the Dark Souls™ universe. Players choose from a number of core character classes and explore dangerous locations full of monsters, treasures, and deadly boss fights.

Designed specifically for the Dark Souls™ universe and introducing a number of innovative gameplay mechanics, with world-class miniatures faithful to the rich universe, this game delivers an experience that captures the very essence of the original video games.

We don’t like complicated Kickstarters, so we’ve made this one as simple as possible. There is just one pledge level for gamers, and one pledge for retail stores.

As the campaign progresses, some stretch goals will unlock an ‘Add-On’ which is an optional item to purchase; to buy one of these, simply increase your pledge amount. This also drives the campaign total up thereby unlocking even more stuff!

The best bit is that every 'non Add-On' stretch goal that gets unlocked during the campaign will be included in your pledge! So the more people that support the project, the more goals get unlocked, the more value we can squeeze in, and the bigger the box we're going to need!

Dark Souls™ - The Board Game is much more than a classic dungeon crawler. Just like the Dark Souls™ video games, this is a game that requires strategic thinking, clever planning, and exemplary execution to succeed.

Dragon Slayer Ornstein & Executioner Smough

To triumph, players must explore dangerous locations, discover and defeat enemies, and collect equipment and treasures before ultimately facing the boss in an epic fight to the death.

The Player Characters - Knight, Warrior, Herald & Assassin

Playable in either Solo or Co-op modes, players choose their role from a number of core Dark Souls™ character classes. Each class has a distinct role to play in the game, with a unique set of strengths and abilities.

With multiple difficulty modes and a high-level of replayability, this is a game designed to be deep enough to satisfy hard-core tabletop gamers whilst remaining accessible to newer players.

Dark Souls™ - The Board Game features an exciting "fast setup, long reveal" mechanic that gets you into the game faster and builds the location and encounters as you explore.

With no fixed scenario layouts, it’s as simple as choosing the direction to explore, placing a new tile down and flipping a card from the Encounter deck.

Each time you decide where to go, you will experience a new danger as you explore, with each new location a real risk to your hard-won progress. If you die, then you drop everything you have collected and reappear at the nearest bonfire. So do you return to the bonfire to rest and spend Souls to strengthen up, but in doing so fully reset the locations? Or do you press on and pray that the next encounter isn’t beyond your capabilities? After all, the next location may contain a clue to the Boss and how to defeat them…

Combat is both fast and deadly. Dark Souls™ - The Board Game rewards clever players and punishes ‘button mashing’. Players must learn enemy behaviors in order to fight more effectively, with classic fighting game style combat windows.

The Titanite Demon mini-boss

The game features a “dynamic positioning system” which makes combat fluid and ever-changing. With the game state constantly shifting as combatants move around the battlefield, players must stay alert to danger and opportunities.

Equipment, armour, and weapons are discovered or earned during play, but with limited slots players must think carefully about what is best to keep and use. Using a simple stamina management system, players can potentially leave themselves exhausted and vulnerable. Death is usually swift to follow a poor decision in combat.

The Dancer of the Boreal Valley boss accompanied by a group of Hollow

Using our advanced miniatures development pipeline and working with one of the finest board game manufacturers in the world, the quality and detail in the miniatures is world-class. With the entirety of the Dark Souls™ universe available to use, one of the hardest decisions has been to narrow down which enemies and bosses to include in the core game.

The Gargoyle mini-boss

The Core Game contains:

3 Boss Models

5 Mini-Boss Models

4 Player Character Models

4 Large Grunt Models

12 Grunt Models

7 Double Sided Game Tiles

2 Double Sided Mini-Boss/Boss Tiles

4 Player Character Boards

3 Boss Dials for Tracking Damage

60 Equipment Cards

40 Treasure Cards

26 Boss AI Cards

36 Encounter Cards

15 Coloured Dice

100+ Game Tokens

Prepare to Die...

Check out the prototype Boss Fight versus the Dancer of the Boreal Valley and people's reactions to it...

Add-Ons will unlock as the campaign progresses. To purchase these Add-Ons simply increase your pledge amount by the amount stated. After the Kickstarter campaign ends you will then be able to select your options via our pledge management system.

The Mega Boss Expansions (+£28) are additional purchases you can make to enhance your board game experience. These models are big - the Gaping Dragon is around 12-15cm tall! They also come with additional items to support their gameplay:

A Tileset for the Mega Boss Encounter (vary in quantity dependent on the boss)

1 Boss Dial for tracking damage

A Unique Mega Boss AI Deck that fully replicates their movements and attacks within the actual game itself

Specific Mega Boss Treasure Cards

The Gaping Dragon

Black Dragon Kalameet

The Guardian Dragon

The Four Kings (4 Models Included)

The Darkroot Basin Expansion (+£35) brings some iconic characters to the game including Sif, the Great Grey Wolf. This expansion comes with:

2 Boss Models (Sif & Artorias)

7 Large Grunt Models

7 Grunt Models

2 Boss Dials

New Treasure Cards

New Encounter Cards

Boss AI Decks for Sif and Artorias

If you want to explore some new locations within the universe then the Darkroot Basin/Iron Keep Gaming Tiles Add-On (+£15) is for you! These double sided tiles will feature artwork from the Darkroot Basin and Iron Keep environments from the game and will allow backers more options of exploration during their game play sessions.

Please NOTE that they are NOT required in order to use the Darkroot Basin/Iron Keep Expansions.

You can also purchase multiple Souls Pledges by increasing your pledge amount by +£80 per pledge. NOTE: There is no Early Bird discount on these additional pledges. The 'Extra Souls Pledge' gets you a second copy of the Core Game with Applicable Stretch Goals.

"A lot of the minutia is even the same, like bosses changing attack patterns midway through battle (which is true of Dark Souls 3 at any rate), and you heal up using carefully managed Estus Flasks. Positioning plays an important role in these battles as each attack is limited to a certain selection of nearby nodes." - Eurogamer

"it looks like a very cool board game, with excellent miniatures, that may very well scratch the Dark Souls tabletop itch so many of us have had for so long now." - Forbes

"Steamforged Games' official tabletop game based on Dark Souls will adopt the series' notorious level of difficulty, according to the board game maker." - Polygon

"We really want to play that Dark Souls board game" - Destructiod

"Steamforged has had experience with Kickstarter in the past. The tabletop maker held a campaign for its medieval football game, Guild Ball. The campaign was successful; it exceeded its £30,000 ($42,352.50) goal, raising a total of £93,691 ($132,268.27)." - Gamespot

"Dark Souls is an exceptionally good video game series, but can it work as a board game? It looks like we'll have the opportunity to find out soon, because board game company Steamforged Games is planning to make one, with the blessing of Dark Souls publisher Bandai Namco." - PCGamer

"The attention to detail is astounding, and the figures might be worth it on their own" - Kotaku

"if you're looking for even more Souls in your life, you're in luck." - Game Informer

"this is certainly something to watch out for." - Tech Times

"If you're a fan of Dark Souls, and you want to share the experience with your friends outside the game, an upcoming Kickstarter may be of interest to you." - The Escapist

"If you haven't had enough ways to die in Dark Souls games, then you may want to consider getting your virtual wallet ready to support an upcoming tabletop endeavor for the franchise." - Shack News

As the Campaign progresses, we will unlock a number of stretch goals that will be added to your SOULS PLEDGE for Kickstarter backers for FREE!

We know the challenges retail faces with Kickstarter projects. This project is our first step towards changing this for the retailers.

Steamforged Games Ltd are determined to support retail at every level. With our previous project - Guild Ball, we committed that after the project had launched all further products within the range would be direct to retail. We kept that promise. With Dark Souls™ - we go one step further and are building support directly into the Kickstarter itself.

The Retailer Pledge level contains 6 copies Dark Souls™ - The Board Game along with a number of other benefits:

Retailer Bonus Unlocks - We have built into the Kickstarter several additional retailer bonus unlocks that once unlocked (via the number of retail backers in the campaign) will provide 'Add-On' purchases available only at retail and not purchasable during the Kickstarter by backers. These will not be limited runs but a general release available to all customers upon launch of the game in shops.

Current Bonus Unlock Items

Exclusive Timed Access - You will be the first stores to receive the Core Game and the only stores to have 4 weeks early access to the launch day products and retailer exclusive stretch goal products upon release.

Exclusive Point of Sale Items - Along with your retail stock, we will send exclusive point of sale items as a thank you for supporting us from the start.

To help retailers guarantee their initial stock, you may purchase additional Retailer Pledges by increasing the pledge amount.

We will be supporting localisation options for the game and have confirmed the following languages currently:

English

French

Spanish

German

Italian

We are also considering other localisation options depending on demand during and after the Kickstarter campaign ends. You will be able to choose the language of your version via the pledge manager system.

Shipping will be charged after the Kickstarter finishes based on actual costs incurred to ship and is collected via our pledge manager system. This allows us to charge fairly for all backers and avoid a 'one size fits all' mentality to shipping.

We will ship your pledges to several hubs around the world at our cost. Your pledge will arrive via one of the following hubs:

United Kingdom (UK and Rest of the World backers)

USA (US backers)

Canada (Canadian backers)

Germany (EU backers)

China (Asia Pacific backers)

Australia (Australia and New Zealand backers)

Below are our initial rough estimates for shipping the core game (4kg volumetric weight). These are just estimates - costs may rise due to weight increase as more items are unlocked via stretch goals and add-on purchases you choose.

UNITED KINGDOM: £7

USA: £7-£11 to most states. £22 to Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico.

CANADA: £7-£15 to most cities.

EUROPE: £7 to Germany.

£10-£22 to most other countries.

£25 to Norway, Finland, Estland, Lettland, and Latvia.

£30 to Bosnia/Herzegowina, Croatia, and Serbia.

£40 to Bulgaria, Lithuania, and Romania.

£43 to Iceland, Russia, and Israel.

£50 to Greece, Turkey, and Ukraine.

LATIN AMERICA: £35-£43 to most countries.

ASIA: £7 to China and Hong Kong. £22 to most other countries (no estimate available for Malaysia).

OCEANIA: £9-£18 to Australia. £22 to New Zealand.

AFRICA: £50 to most countries.

Any pledges confirmed after our pledge manager deadline window will be shipped from the UK hub at a later date and will likely incur increased shipping costs.

Below is the general schedule once the Kickstarter ends so you know when to expect money to be taken and our overall shipping plan - again these are estimates:

We are fully aware of potential delays that may happen with products that are produced in China - the common ones being production, shipping, and customs delays.

We have estimated the delivery for April 2017 but please understand this is only an estimate. Due to the global logistics involved in shipping, some regions may receive their pledges sooner than others. We will, however, ensure a global release of any 'Retailer Stretch Goals' and future Dark Souls™ products for retailers.

We have prepared as much as possible with our production for a successful Kickstarter, however we will refund pledges if for some unforeseen reason the game cannot be delivered at all.

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Refunds
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Refunds may be given within 60 days of the campaign ending including fees. After this time refunds may be given minus the Kickstarter and payment processing fees due to us not being able to claim them back after 60 days.

If we have begun the packaging and shipment stages of the project (around 6-8 weeks before the actual shipping date) we are unable to refund at this stage.

Refunds within 60 days are reversed via Stripe to your credit/debit card. Refunds after 60 days of the campaign ending are processed via PayPal only.

This is a GBP Kickstarter and refunds will be processed in GBP for the amount received, excluding any applicable fees dependent on the day at which the refund is processed as detailed above.

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Terms and Conditions
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If you do not confirm your shipping and pledge details within 10 weeks of our notification via email to confirm it will be treated as abandoned. We will however look at each case sympathetically and try our best to satisfy each customer.

By pledging on this Kickstarter you agree that our responsibility to you is for shipping your order as entered into the pledge management system. You are responsible for import or other duties that may be payable to relevant tax authorities. You also accept that you are fully liable for incorrect shipping details and will risk your pledge being unable to be delivered or lost in transit.

We are unable to ship to PO Boxes.

If you do not accept the proposed terms please do not pledge on this Kickstarter project and wait for the global general release.